Soccer: Fourth referee to be trialed

Fifa president Sepp Blatter said experiments with a fourth referee will be held next year following errors at the finals.

Blatter said the fourth official would be placed behind the goals where he could watch incidents in the penalty area, freeing the assistant referees to concentrate on enforcing the offside rule.

Blatter said he also favoured a return to a trio of officials of the same nationality because communication problems had caused several mistakes. He had previously backed the need for the best referees, regardless of nationality.

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